Study Desk

If you hurt others because of something you eat, then you are no longer acting from love. Do not let the food that you eat ruin the person for whom Christ died!

Do not, because of food, destroy what God has done. All foods may be eaten, but it is wrong to eat anything that will cause someone else to fall into sin.

But if they have doubts about what they eat, God condemns them when they eat it, because their action is not based on faith. And anything that is not based on faith is sin.

But in this letter I have been quite bold about certain subjects of which I have reminded you. I have been bold because of the privilege God has given me

I always give thanks to my God for you because of the grace he has given you through Christ Jesus.

Whoever does not have the Spirit cannot receive the gifts that come from God's Spirit. Such a person really does not understand them, and they seem to be nonsense, because their value can be judged only on a spiritual basis.

I had to feed you milk, not solid food, because you were not ready for it. And even now you are not ready for it,

because you still live as the people of this world live. When there is jealousy among you and you quarrel with one another, doesn't this prove that you belong to this world, living by its standards?

The one who plants and the one who waters really do not matter. It is God who matters, because he makes the plant grow.

I write this to you, not because I want to make you feel ashamed, but to instruct you as my own dear children.

Some of you have become proud because you have thought that I would not be coming to visit you.

But because there is so much immorality, every man should have his own wife, and every woman should have her own husband.

Do not deny yourselves to each other, unless you first agree to do so for a while in order to spend your time in prayer; but then resume normal marital relations. In this way you will be kept from giving in to Satan's temptation because of your lack of self-control.

I would like you to be free from worry. An unmarried man concerns himself with the Lord's work, because he is trying to please the Lord.

But a married man concerns himself with worldly matters, because he wants to please his wife;

and so he is pulled in two directions. An unmarried woman or a virgin concerns herself with the Lord's work, because she wants to be dedicated both in body and spirit; but a married woman concerns herself with worldly matters, because she wants to please her husband.

I am saying this because I want to help you. I am not trying to put restrictions on you. Instead, I want you to do what is right and proper, and to give yourselves completely to the Lord's service without any reservation.

And so this weak person, your brother for whom Christ died, will perish because of your "knowledge"!

Even if others do not accept me as an apostle, surely you do! Because of your life in union with the Lord you yourselves are proof of the fact that I am an apostle.

I don't have to limit myself to these everyday examples, because the Law says the same thing.